Death by Consensus: The Westray Mine Story

Table of Recorded Coal-Mining Explosion Fatalities Pictou County, 1838–1952 Year Number Killed 1838 2 1858 2 1861 3 1872 60 1880 44 1885 13 1914 2 1918 88 1924 4 1952 19 Source: Cameron James M. , The Pictonian Colliers. (Halifax: Nova Scotia Museum, 1974), 163–253. These recurring episodes only came to an end when the incidence of coal mining declined sharply during the 1960s. Almost all of the coal mining which led to these “accidents” in Pictou County took place as investors sought to take advantage of a particularly rich deposit sited there, known as the Foord seam. Westray was the most recent adventurer to seek to extract profit from that treacherous seam.

Miners have the third highest fatality rate in Canada, after forestry and fishing. It is over seven times the average. Labor Canada, Employment Injuries and Occupational Illnesses, 1985–87 (Ministry of Supply and Services, 1990), Table 6.

The government of Nova Scotia has appointed a judge to head a commission of inquiry; the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) has begun a police investigation; the minister responsible for mine safety in the province has ordered his own department to investigate its performance and the causes of the disasters; and the owner of Westray Mine has hired its own investigation team.

Braithwaite John , To Punish or Persuade (Albany: S.U.N.Y. Press, 1985); Hopkins Andrew , “Blood Money? The Effect of Bonus Pay on Safety in Coal Mines” (1984) 20: 1 Australia and New Zealand Journal of Sociology 23; and Caudill Harry M. , “Manslaughter in a Coal Mine,” The Nation, 23 April, 1977. As the text will show, such violations had preceded the explosion at Westray.

For similar analyses of accident inquiries, see Carson W. G. , “Occupational Health and Safety: A Political Economy Perspective” (1989), 2 Labor & Industry 301, esp. at 310–15, and Carson Kit and Henenberg Cathy , “The Political Economy of Legislative Change: Making Sense of Victoria's New Occupational Health and Safety Legislation” (1988), 6 Law in Context 2, esp. at 3–8. A recent Canadian example of this approach to the investigation of occupational health and safety disasters was the Royal Commission on the Ocean Ranger Marine Disaster. For a critique, see Carson W. G. , “Ocean Ranger Still More Questions to Come” (1984), 7: 4 At the Center 15. Ironically, these academic critiques are substantiated by an explosion in nearby Cape Breton on Feb. 24, 1979. Twelve coal miners were killed at the federally operated mine. The ensuing investigation and report recommended changes in safety practices and investigations to prevent the recurrence of conditions which led to the explosions. These recommendations were accepted. The conditions which were sought to be prevented bear a striking resemblance to the ones which prevailed at Westray only 13 years later and only a few miles away.

The literature on staple-led growth is extensive. For an overview, see Brodie Janine , The Political Economy of Canadian Regionalism (Toronto: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1990).

Langille Brian , “The Michelin Amendment in Context” (1981), 6 Dalhousie L.J. 523.

On the history of mining in Pictou County generally, see Cameron James M. , The Pictonian Colliers, op. cit. n.1.

Ash is an impurity which may have to be removed, increasing the cost of coal production.

George E. Wimpey of Canada Ltd. explored the option of open pit mining in 1979 and the Nova Corporation conducted tests between 1979 and 1987 to determine whether methane extraction was commercially viable. See Placer Development Limited, Pictou Project Feasibility Study, Vol. 1, Geology (July 1987), Table 1.2. (PPFS); (released by federal government, available on request).

PPFS, Vol. 2, Mining, 2. One parameter is that there should be isolation of units to permit sealing off of worked-out areas to minimize the risk of spontaneous combustion.

Id., 43–6.

This approach is widespread. A study of American mine engineers found that “the mining engineer was compelled to subordinate whatever technical considerations might create conflicts to more comprehensive and commanding economic considerations … But it would be wrong to presume that many mining engineers found this to be a particularly stressful situation, for in the past, as at present, they largely accepted the industry on its own terms;” Donovan Arthur L , “Health and Safety in Underground Coal Mining, 1900–1969: Professional Conduct in a Peripheral Industry” in Bayer Ronald ed., The Health and Safety of Workers [:] Case Studies in the Politics of Professional Responsibility (New York Oxford U.P., 1988) at 100. Also see Graebner William , “Private Power, Private Knowledge, and Public Health: Science, Engineering, and Lead Poisoning, 1900–1970,” ibid, who concludes, at 26, “engineers, no less than owners and managers, were profit — and production — conscious.”

PPFS, Vol. 1, Mining 6. This kind of ‘neutral’ expertise serves players and governments very well when making plans and, even more so, when confronted with disaster. For instance, when Westray mine manager Gerald Phillips was asked about the risk of methane explosions prior to the opening of the mine, he said that the history of deaths in the Pictou coal fields had “more to do with the old mining methods” and that the mine would use “modern monitoring systems … [so] you can detect a problem [methane gas] before it comes a real problem.” Chronicle-Herald, 9 May 1989, 2. As for the way in which this kind of faith in expertise was used after the explosion, see infra.

Id. 129. One of the techniques they expected to be satisfactory was roof and pillar mining, something which would necessitate skilled and experienced miners who could exercise a good deal of on-the-spot judgment. Typical of technology enthusiasts, they assumed away the problem of finding the right workers and ignored any pressures which might affect workers' judgment calls.

Later, Westray, in the business plan prepared by it for the purposes of obtaining financing for the mine, asserted that Suncor and, then, Placer did not proceed with the development of the mine because each had decided to concentrate their activities in other resource sectors (oil and precious metals respectively). See Loan Insurance Agreement, Schedule “B,” 3, (released by the federal government; available on request). There is no independent confirmation of this.

Kilborn Limited, Technical and Cost Review of the Pictou County Coal Project Nova Scotia, Volume 1, 3–5; (available on request).

Id. at 3-18-3-19.

CANMET, Westray Coal Incorporated Pictou County Coal Project: Technical Review (n.d.), 1; (available on request).

Id., 3.

Id., 5.

Id., 8.

Coal Mines Regulation Act, R.S.N.S. 1989, c. 73, s. 104(l)(b).

The former chair of Devco, Ms. MacNeil, has been quoted as saying that Devco's opposition “was around economics, not safety. We would all like to think today that we were all preaching safety. Safety was a factor, it was mentioned (only) [sic].” Canadian Press, 13 May 1992. Canadian Press entries will hereinafter be cited as CP. These righteous statements must have had a macabre ring to insiders given Devco's own disaster in 1979; see Ref. 5.

Chronicle-Herald, 9 May 1989, 35. The refusing workers were disciplined; see Curragh Resources v. U.S.W.A., Local 1051 (1990), 5 Can. Occ H&S Cases 81.

Chronicle-Herald (Halifax), 18 August 1989, 1–2.

For Nova Scotia, see Environment Assessment Act, S.N.S. 1988, c. 11. The federal Environmental Assessment Review Process (EARP) was created by Cabinet directives.

For instance, see Curragh Resources Inc., 1990 Annual Report, where it is stated, “For the mining industry, protection of the environment is a priority … At Curragh, we are always searching for new technologies to help us minimize impact on the ecology.” (no page number).

PPFS, Vol 4, 8.

CANMET's reviewer described the arrangement with Nova Scotia Power Corporation as “particularly attractive,” p. 9.

CP, 8 June, 1992.

Many of the dealings are shrouded in secrecy. The Nova Scotia Power Corporation, with the support of the government, refused to disclose the details of its contract with Westray to the Public Accounts Committee of the legislature; CP, 3 & 31 May, 1989. The details of the government's “take or pay” deal with Westray are the subject of a freedom of information action brought in court by Mr. Boudreau, a member of the Liberal opposition in the Nova Scotia legislature. Curragh Resources Inc. has joined the government in fighting disclosure; CP, 5 November, 1991, 17 February 1992.

CP, 2 September, 1988.

CP, 11 April, 1989. The failure to reach an agreement with the federal government subsequently caused construction of the mine to be halted in late July. It did not resume until January 1990; CP, 31 August, 1989, 4 January, 1990.

CP, 14 December, 1990. The links between Eric Barker, the owner of Satellite Equipment, and Don Cameron and the fact that the contract with Westray was awarded without tender became the subject of an expose on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's national investigative news show, The Fifth Estate, aired on December 11, 1990. Clifford Frame, in defending the contract, was quoted as saying, “I'd give a contract to the devil if he would do the job cheaper than somebody else.” CP, 11 December, 1990.

CP, 19 May, 1992.

If anything, Curragh did even better there. In addition to financial guarantees, it obtained huge environmental concessions, subsidized power and transport and wage and work-practice concessions from the workers; see Lourie Bruce A. , “Northern Resource Decision-Makers: A Case Study of the Faro Mine, Yukon Territory” in Adamo Peter and Johnson Peter G. , eds., Student Research in Canada's North: Proceedings of the National Students' Conference, Nov. 1986 (Ottowa: Assoc, of Can. Universities for Northern Studies, 1988).

Cameron Stevie , Globe and Mail, June 8, 1992, A4.

As quoted in CP, May 11, 1992. The same language was used in the CANMET review, supra.

Earlier that month, thousands of fish were killed when Satellite Construction discharged a chlorine-based solution it had used to flush out water pipes at the Westray mine into a nearby river. The work had been approved by Westray. In contrast to the way in which violations of health and safety laws were handled. Satellite was charged and convicted of offences under the Nova Scotia Water Act and Environmental Protection Act; CP, June 4,7,12, 1991, CP, April 2, 1992.

CP, May 13, 1992.

CP, 3 July, 1991.

Memorandum from Claude White, Director, Mine Safety to Executive Director, Ministry of Labor, 21 Oct. 1991, (available on request).

CP, 28 May 1992.

CP, 23 May, 1992.

Cox Kevin , Globe and Mail, 30 July, 1992; Coal Mines Regulation Act, op cit. n. 23, ss. 72 & 85.

Cox Kevin , op. cit. n. 46.

Coal Mines Regulation Act., op cit. n. 23, s. 70(5).

CP, May 11, 1992.

CP, May 12, 1992.

CP, May, 25 1992.

CP, May 23, 1992.

CP, May 18, 1992.

CP, May 11, 1991.

Cox Kevin , Globe and Mail, 30 July, 1992.

In Canada, the constitutional boundary between federal and provincial jurisdiction is drawn on the basis of this distinction: True crime falls within federal jurisdiction, regulatory offences are within the provincial domain.

For a sampling of the literature which explores the historical development of the ideology and practrice of occupational health and safety regulation from this perspective, see Carson W.G. , “The Conventionalization of Early Factory Crime” (1979), 7 International Journal of the Sociology of Law 37 (England); Tucker E. , Administering Danger in the Workplace: The Law and Politics of Occupational Health and Safety Regulation in Ontario, 1850–1914 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990) (Ontario); and Gunningham Neil , Safeguarding the Worker (Sydney: Law Book Co., 1984), (Australia).

The views of these influential reformers were expressed in reports of various government inquiries in comparable jurisdictions. For example. Safety and Health and Work, U.K. Cmnd. 5034 (Robens Report), 1972; Ontario, Report of the Royal Commission on the Health and Safety of Workers in Mines (Attorney General of Ontario, 1976) (Ham Report); Report of the Joint Federal-Provincial Inquiry Commission into Safety in Mines and Mining Plants in Ontario, Towards Safe Production (1981) (Burkett Report) and Report of the Commission of Inquiry into Occupational Health and Safety, 1981 (N.S.W., Australia) (Williams Report).

For critical appraisals of the reforms, see Sass Robert , “A Critique: Canadian Public Policy in Workplace Health and Safety,” New Solutions (Fall, 1991), 39 and “The Implications of Work Organization for Occupational Health Policy: The Case for Canada” (1989), 19 Int'l J. of Health Services, 163; Walters Vivienne & Haines Ted , “Workers' Use and Knowledge of the ‘Internal Responsibility System:’ limits to Participation in Occupational Health and Safety” (1988), 14 Can Pub. Pol, 411 and Tucker Eric , “Worker Participation in Health and Safety Regulation: Lessons from Sweden,” (1992), 37 Studies in Political Economy 95. For a more positive evaluation, see Swinton Katherine E. , “Enforcement of Occupational Health and Safety Legislation: The Role of the Internal Responsibility System” in Swan Kenneth and Swinton Katherine E eds., Studies in Labor Law (Toronto: Butterworths, 1983), 143.

This is not to say that such a scheme could not be administered more vigorously. This happens when labor-friendly political parties can generate this kind of pressure, as occurred in Saskatchewan from 1974 to 1982 when, under NDP government, Bob Sass served as Director of the Occupational Health and Safety branch of the Department of Labor and introduced many progressive reforms, and in Ontario when the New Democratic Party was able to influence a minority Liberal Party government. But the underlying assumptions remain the same and the more usual slack enforcement is likely to return as soon as the pressure is reduced. This does not require formal changes in the regulatory mechanism. The example of Saskatchewan in the period following the defeat of the NDP is instructive. See Sass Robert , “The Tory Assault on Labor in Saskatchewan” (1987), 7 Windsor Yrbk. of Acc. to just. 133, esp. at 143–7.

See Hopkins Andrew & Parnell Nina , “Why Coal Mine Safety Regulations in Australia Are Not Enforced,” (1984), 12 International Journal of the Sociology of Law 179–94; Hopkins Andrew , “Crime Without Punishment the Appin Mine Disaster,” in Grabowsky Peter and Sutton Adam , eds., Stains on a White Collar (Sydney: Hutchinson Australia, 1989), 160 and Curran Daniel J. , “Symbolic Solutions for Deadly Dilemmas: An Analysis of Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Legislation” (1984) 14 Int'l J. of Health Services 5.

S.N.S. 1881, c.5, ss. 1,2, & 8; c. 21; and S.N.S. 1891, c. 9, ss. 12 & 14 On the background to these legislative changes, see MacLeod Donald , “Colliers, Colliery Safety and Workplace Control: The Nova Scotia Experience, 1873 to 1910” (1983), C.H.A. Historical Papers 226 and McKay Ian , The Provincial Workmen's Association: A Brief Survey of Several Problems of Interpretation” in Cherwinski W.J.C. & Kealey Gregory S. , eds., Lectures in Canadian Labor and Working Class History (St. John's: CCLH & NHP, 1985), 127–34.

R.S.N.S. 1989, c.73, ss. 142 & 146.

S.N.S. 1985, c.3, s.49 and S.P.E.L 1985, c.36.

The highest fine, $500,000, is set in Ontario. Alberta is next at $150,000. Manitoba is closer to Nova Scotia with a maximum fine of $15,000.

Compiled from Nova Scotia, Department of Labor, Annual Reports, 1985–86 to 1989–90. In the 1988–89 report, only the total amount of fines levied was reported, ($8,700 from four convictions) making it impossible to ascertain the highest fine. In another tabulation of prosecution data, a total of 97 charges were laid between the fiscal years 1987–88 and 1991–92, resulting in 42 convictions and fines totaling $69,750. (Letter from Jim LeBlanc, Director, Occupational Health/Safety Training, Nova Scotia Department of Labor, to Eric Tucker, 19 August, 1992). The discrepancy between the number of companies charged and the number of charges may result from the fact that any one company may be charged with a number of offences at the same time.

Scotia Nova , Assembly Debates, 10 July, 1991.

These speculations have been confirmed by a report commissioned by the Ministry of Labor of Nova Scotia from the independent firm of Coopers and Lybrand. It found that the responsible department was poorly organized and managed and, consequently, routinely failed to follow up on safety orders at work sites. (Toronto Star, 30 April 1994, A12).

Financial Times of Canada, 15 April, 1991, 20.

Robinson Allan , “Won't Gamble Again, Curragh Head Says,” Globe and Mail, 6 May 1992, B6.

CP, 5 September, 29 November, 1991.

CP, 30 October, 1991.

Cox Kevin , Globe and Mail, May 16, 17, 1992, and interviews with Cox and Pink Ronald Mr. , the lawyer representing the U.S.W. A. at the judicial inquiry into the disaster. There is some controversy over the effect of production bonuses on safety, many believing it to be adverse but, for a skeptical view, see Hopkins , “Blood Money?” op. cit. n.4.

On the general relationship between productivity pressure and accidents, see Grunberg Leon , The Effects of the Social Relations of Production on Productivity and Workers' Safety: An Ignored Set of Relationships' (1983), 13 Int'l J. of Health Services, 621. In the context of coal mining, see Wallace Michael , “Dying for Coal: The Struggle for Health and Safety Conditions in American Coal Mining, 1930–82” (1987), 66 Social Forces, 336 at 343. For a similar analysis in other work contexts, see Wright Chris , “Routine Deaths: Fatal Accidents in the Oil Industry” (1986) 34 Soc. Rev., 265 and Novek Joel , “Mechanization, the Labor Process, and Injury Risks in the Canadian Meat Packing Industry” (1990), 20 Int'l J. of Health Services 281.

Glenen Dave , New Glasgow Evening News, January 12, 1992, January 16, 1992; Jones Randy , The Mail-Star, January 15,1992; Roberts Rob , The Daily News, January 17, 1992.

Interview with Boudreau B. , Liberal member of the Nova Scotia Legislative Assembly and an early critic of the Westray project.

Cameron Stevie , Globe and Mail, 29 June, 1992; Scotia Nova , Assembly Debates, 24 June, 1992, pp. 10524–10527.

Globe & Mail, 16 July, 1992; Toronto Star, Sept. 4, 1992. This turn-around is illustrative of the argument made earlier that environmental concerns can be more readily mobilized than occupational health and safety ones. An investigative television report. The Fifth Estate, broadcast by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation on April 6, 1994, produced evidence that Curragh Resources asked bereaved families to help them in their efforts to get access to the strip mine. The alleged bargain was that, if they did so, Curragh would make efforts to recover the bodies of the missing miners.

For example, see Viscusi Kip W. , Risk by Choice (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1983). For a recent effort to re-calculate the implicit monetary value workers place on life and limb, see Moore Michael J. and Viscusi Kip W. , Compensation Mechanisms for fob Risks (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990).

See Risk R.C.B. , “This Nuisance of Litigation: ‘The Origins of Workers’ Compensation in Ontario” in Flaherty David , eds., Essays in the History of Canadian law, Vol. 2 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1983), 418, and Tucker Eric , “The Law of Employers' Liability in Ontario 1861–190O. The Search for a Theory” (1984), 22 Osgoode Hall Law Journal 213.

CP, May 11, 1992.

Willis Paul , Learning to Labor (New York Columbia U.P., 1981), 150. Also see Cockburn Cynthia , Brothers (London: Pluto Press, 1983), 132–140 and Haas Jack , “Learning Real Feelings” (1977) 4: 2 Soc. of Work and Occ., 47.

See Hopkins , “Blood Money,” op cit. n.4, pp 31–4. In our view he discounts the influence of bonuses a little too much.

Ackerlof George A. and Dickens William T. , The Economic Consequences of Cognitive Dissonance” (1982), 72 American Economic Review 307, esp. 308.

Michael MacAfee, CP, 11 May, 1992.

These data, derived from Statistics Canada, are presented in Acres International Limited, Westray Coal Mine Initial Environmental Evaluation, Final Report, January 1990 (Industry, Science and Technology Canada), 4-18-4-26.

In addition to the problems discussed here, there is a large literature which critically evaluates the assumption economists make that workers rationally calculate risk and behave accordingly. These relate to issues such as imperfect information, improper understanding of probability relationships, etc. For a sample, see Chasse John Dennis and LeSourd David A. , “Rational Decisions and Occupational Health: A Critical View,” (1984), 14 Int'l.]. of Health Services 433; Felstiner W.L.F. & Siegelman Peter , “Neoclassical Difficulties: Tort Deterrence for Latent Injuries,” (1989), 11 law & Policy 309.

S.25., Occupational Health and Safety Act, 1985, c.3, s.1.

Jeffers Allan , CP, May 28, 1992; s.25 (2d) Occupational Health and Safety Act.

CP, May 22, 1991.

It is worth pointing out that when Curragh Resources began its endeavors in the Yukon, again with federal government guarantees and territorial hand-outs, one of the attractions for it was that the work force was not unionized. Eventually it did become a unionized enterprise, as did Westray in the aftermath of the disaster.

Robb Nancy , The History of Westray,” July/August. 1992, Occupational Health and Safety Canada 43.

CP, May 28, 1992.

Again we want to underscore that what happened at Westray was normal. Two independent studies in two jurisdictions have found that the ratio of unreported to reported claims is 3:1. See Harpur Keith , “Work accidents ‘three times reported rate.’” Guardian Dec. 12,1991, 6 (reporting on HSE study) and Brickey Stephen & Grant Karen , “An Empirical Examination of Work-Related Accidents and Illnesses in Winnipeg,” (Paper presented at Manitoba Federation of Labor Conference on Workplace Health and Safety, April 27, 1992).

CP, 28 May, 1992.

For a more extended discussion, see Glasbeek H. J. , “A Role for Criminal Sanctions in Occupational Health and Safety” in Meredith Memorial Lectures 1988, New Developments in Employment Law (Les Editions Yvon Blais: Cowansville, Que., 1989).

Fisher Matthew , Globe and Mail 1 Sept. 1986, B6.

Murty K. , and Siddiqi Y. , “Government Subsidies to Industry” 4 Canadian Economic Observer, May 1991 (subsidies by three levels of Canadian government amounted to $10.5 billion in 1986, $12.5 billion in 1987, $11.3 billion in 1988, $11 billion in 1989); John Deutsch Round Table on Economic Policy, Tax Expenditures and Government Policy, proceedings of a conference held at Queen's University, 17–18 November 1988 (Queen's University, 1988); Trebilcock M. , The Political Economy of Business Bailouts, (Toronto: Ontario Economic Council, 1985).

The Law Times, 21 June 1856.

Shareholders may cause the corporation to bring an action because it (notice the reification) is being inequitably treated. This is the derivative action. Shareholders may bring an action in their own right if they can show that their interests have been prejudiced in a discriminatory manner. This is the oppression remedy. It is also available to other interested persons, perhaps even workers. But, thus far, amongst non-shareholders, only a handful of creditors and officials appointed to supervise the administration of corporate law statutes have availed themselves of this extraordinary remedy.

This was when Curragh Resources Inc. became a public company.

The other 26 percent of the shares in Frame Mining Corporation were divided equally between a Swedish company called Boliden Canada Ltd. and Mitsui and Co. (Canada), Ltd, a Japanese company. The former was to be responsible for marketing of lead and zinc concentrates in Europe, the latter in the Far East, on behalf of Curragh Resources Inc. The pre-existing links between Curragh Resources, Curragh Resources Inc., C.H. Frame, and the Westray coal project are manifest.

The Westray Mining Corporation (70 percent of whose shares were owned by C.H. Frame) owned 519,737 of the multiple voting shares in Curragh Resources Inc. At the same time, Frame Mining Corporation (in which Westray Mining Corporation held 74 percent of the shares), held 678,887 of the multiple voting shares in Curragh Resources Inc. Finally, 630902 Ontario Inc., wholly owned by Frame Mining Corporation, held 14,521,113 of the multiple voting shares in Curragh Resources Inc.

When Curragh Resources Inc. bought an interest in the Westray Coal Project by dealing with 630902 Ontario Inc., it bought only 90 percent of the holdings, leaving 630902 Ontario Inc. with the option of retaining a 10 percent interest in the mining lease and exploration licenses and to enter into a joint venture with Curragh Resources Inc. to further develop the property or to convert its interest into a five percent cash flow royalty totalling approximately $15 million which would be paid before any other royalty was paid out. This is known as a back-in deal and is relatively common in the industry. It is not the unusual nature of the deal, then, to which attention is drawn, but the fact that, once again, an arrangement was made which would profit a major promoter and shareholder in this web of dealings.

Another reason for denying that health and safety as an industrial relations issue is that employers and state officials wish to contain any erosion of managerial prerogative resulting from the extension to workers of weak rights to participate in production decisions affecting their physical well-being. By insisting that these rights are bestowed in a sphere which falls outside ‘normal’ industrial relations, the standard exclusion of workers from decision-making in general can be sustained. See Creighton Breen and Gunningham Neil , Is there an Industrial Relations of Occupational Health and Safety?” in Creighton and Gunningham , eds., The Industrial Relations of Occupational Health and Safety (Sydney: Croon Helm, 1985), 4–5 and Walters Vivienne , “State Mediation of Conflicts over Work Refusals: The Role of the Ontario Labor Relations Board” (1991), 21 Int'l. J. of Health Services 717.

On the role of worker protest in the development of U.S. mine safety legislation, see Curran Daniel J. , “Symbolic Solutions” op.cit. n. 61 and Wallace Michael , “Dying for Coal” op cit. n.74.

See Navarro Vicente , “The Determinants of Social Policy — A Case Study: Regulating Health and Safety at the Workplace in Sweden” (1983), 14 Int'l J. of Health Services 517.

Tucker Eric , “Worker Participation in Health and Safety Regulation: Lessons from Sweden” (1992), 37 Studies in Political Economy 95.

Noble Charles , Liberalism at Work: The Rise and Fall of OSHA (Philadelphia: Temple U.P., 1986) and Szasz Andrew , “The Reversal of Federal Policy Toward Worker Safety and Health” (1986), 50 Science and Society 25. The sensitivity of fatality rates in coal mining to the level of government spending on enforcement of strong coal mining safety laws has been demonstrated by Perry Charles S. , “Government Regulation of Coal Mine Safety” (1982), 10 American Politics Quarterly 303.

Clancy James , President of NUPGE, National Union News, May 1992 (writing about the Westray disaster).

Wright Erik Olin , Class, Crisis and the State (London: New Left Books, 1978).

Glasbeek H. J. , “A Role for Criminal Sanctions in Occupational Health and Safety” op.cit. n.96 and Tucker , “Worker Participation” op. cit. n. 108.

In this regard, it is interesting to note that the Cape Breton Development Corporation Act, R.S.C. 1985, C-25, which created Devco as a crown corporation for the purpose of conducting mining in Cape Breton, states (at s. 15) that the object of the Coal Division is “to conduct coal mining and related operations in the Sydney coalfield on a basis that is consistent with efficient mining practice and good mine safety.” This inclusion of safety as an independent objective stands in marked contrast to the approach we saw earlier by private coal developers. Of course, as the explosion referred to in Ref. 5 reveals, statements of legislative intent do not necessarily get translated into action, but the possibilities for better health and safety regulation are greater in a publicly run enterprise than in a private one.